


Trial and Error

by Huggle



Category: Supernatural
Genre: BAMF Castiel, Castiel Has Self-Esteem Issues, Castiel in the Bunker, Daddy Issues, Discipline, Emotionally Hurt Castiel, Gen, Guilty Castiel, Guilty Sam, Human Castiel, Hurt Castiel, Protective Dean Winchester, Protective Sam Winchester, Self-Harming Castiel, Self-Sacrificing Castiel, Spanking, Supernatural Kink Meme
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-30
Updated: 2015-12-30
Packaged: 2018-05-10 12:12:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5584948
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Huggle/pseuds/Huggle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam sees the situation for what it is ahead of Dean, but that doesn't mean he has an instant solution. But with Castiel so eager to place himself in harm's way, he'd better find one and fast.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Trial and Error

Sam knows Dean can be good at this.

After all, it was from Dean that he learned most of what he knew. Not that their father wasn’t a good teacher, but his lessons were harsh and not all of them on things that Sam wanted to know.

That made John push all the harder, and sometimes punish just as much. But Dean… Dean had a way of encouraging Sam; cleaning and reassembling a weapon became as much fun as reading about bridge trolls or the best ways to kill tulpas.

He never negated the seriousness of what he was showing Sam, but he kept it light enough that it didn’t seem like Sam would be letting the family down and dooming the whole world if he fumbled loading a clip for the first time.

The problem is that Dean remembers times when he wasn’t so patient with Castiel.

The times when he was – either because he was ready to break, or just being a cold little shit, or bearing his sarcasm like a shield – actually cruel with him.

And he’s letting the memory of those times blind him a little, now.

Because Sam remembers the one time he really did drop the ball, and Dean reamed him out afterwards. Not because he was disappointed or Sam was careless, but because he’d nearly gotten killed and the fear and pain in Dean’s voice drove home the lesson a hundred times more effectively than when John had taken a belt to him.

Sam doesn’t expect Dean to lose it with Cas like that. Because Cas is a grown angel, albeit now human, and Dean can’t see past the times he hurt Cas and let him down.

And that…. That guilt, that regret, is probably going to get Cas, or all of them, killed.

**

The first time Sam knows it’s going to be a problem is actually not on a hunt.

Dean, in his ever questionable wisdom, drags them both out to a bar. Cas can now assemble the Glock .42 Dean got for him, and he can do it blindfolded. It’s a far cry from his unease when Dean had handed him a shotgun with phoenix ash shells when they were hunting down Eve.

So that, Dean tells them, is cause for celebration.

Unfortunately, Dean chooses to celebrate by drunkenly hitting on the waitress. Whose big, grouchy, sober boyfriend is sitting at the bar cracking his knuckles.

All of this Sam learns later from Cas - after he lets his stupid sot of a brother find his own damn way to his bedroom. He has the angel sitting at the table as he puts a few neat stitches in the cut above his eye and thinks about some witch hazel for what’s going to be a bastard of a bruise tomorrow.

“Dean can fight his own battles,” Sam says, pissed that Dean waited until Sam had gone to the men’s room before starting a fight he should have been able to finish without help from Cas.

“I know,” Cas says. “And he can also lose them.”

Part of Sam wishes he’d been there to see Cas haul the boyfriend off Dean and kick his ass ten ways from Sunday. That’s the thing about Cas. He doesn’t look like he can. He’s tall, lean – compact muscle, lithe. So nobody expects him to be able to hand them their ass. Especially if he’s with them, because they’re bigger and harder looking than he is.

Cas will never be the one they see as a threat and that’s an advantage.

But Cas still got hurt, because he didn’t want to see Dean get hurt. Didn’t want to wait to see Dean turn the tables, as Sam knows he surely would have.

In the morning, when Dean stumbles out of his room with what will probably be the worst hangover he’s had in a while, Sam knows he’ll be angry. But at himself, not at Cas, so there will be no lesson in this for their friend.

Sam thinks Cas looks stubbornly defiant as he gets patched up, maybe even a little proud that he was able to show them both he can do this.

That, Sam sees then, is also going to be a problem. Cas has spent so long being judged solely on the basis of what he can do, the services he can provide, that he’s started to weigh himself up in the same manner.

Every hunt from here on in – maybe even _everything_ \- is going to be a proving ground for Cas.

And while Sam knows it’s both of them that Cas will be trying to prove his worth to, it will mainly be for Dean.

Fuck Dean and his baby in a trench coat comment. Shit like that stays with Cas. Even when it wasn’t true in the first place.

**

He does intend to talk to Dean the next morning, but Cas is up before any of them and making breakfast. Pancakes, eggs and bacon, and Sam finds another reason to get annoyed at his brother when he finally stumbles bleary eyed into the kitchen.

The first thing he does is to compliment Cas on his culinary skills in a manner so over the top that Sam wants to slap him. Cas has commanded a Heavenly garrison. He’s the one who fought his way past Hell’s defences and hauled Dean’s ass literally out of the fire.

Frying up some eggs and bacon, making a batch of pancake batter and pouring it on the griddle are not things he probably found too difficult, given he’s been watching them do it.

And then Dean’s gaze settles on the red line of stitches above Castiel’s eye, and for a moment Sam thinks maybe Dean will wise up and tell Cas off about it.

“First bar fight,” Dean says, finally. He reaches over the table and grabs Cas’s arm, gets him to make a fist just so that Dean can bump his own against it.

Sam isn’t sure what to say and ends up saying nothing, because any words that come out of his mouth are going to be sharp and hard and furious and that is not going to help sort this out at all.

**

Despite the cut, he finds Cas later in the room they’d set up for sparring and working out. He stands in the doorway for a minute, watching Cas block and parry and spin in and out of combinations with an effortlessness that almost takes his breath away.

He uses his body as a weapon just as much as the sword he still carries, and Sam wonders if it feels any different in his grip now than it did before when he had the Grace of Heaven pulsing through him.

He also wishes Cas would talk about it, because he knows for a fact bottling things up is not going to do him any favours, and he remembers Dean telling him about the future Zachariah showed him where Cas had found a less healthy method of coping.

And even after that, Dean still finds his own solace in a bottle or in sex, and avoids anything resembling a serious discussion on what’s happening inside him. Then he wonders at how Cas could possibly have ended up how he did in that future.

Sam isn’t sure why he ever thought Dean would be able to deal with this. It’s clearly going to be left to him.

He waits until Cas slows and stops, breathing hard, sweat making his T-shirt stick to him.

“You should probably wait until that starts to knit before you practice,” Sam says. “Pressure can pop stitches, make even minor cuts leak. I found that out the hard way.”

Cas grabs a towel from the floor, and dabs carefully around the cut as he wipes his face then his neck. “I’ll be careful,” he says. “Do you want to practice?”

Sam turns it over briefly in his head. Despite how good he is, Cas could still use some pointers. The main reason for that is he fights not like he thinks he can’t lose, but like he doesn’t yet realise he can get really, badly hurt. 

That, to Sam, is bizarre. Cas has got hurt before, lots of times, too many to count and most of them as an angel. Why he suddenly can’t get his head around the concept that that level of damage visited on him now would kill him, Sam doesn’t know. He’s seen Cas writhing in agony, watched him vomit blood, had to carry him when he was unconscious. 

He doesn’t want to see any of that again, even though he knows with the lives they lead getting hurt is inevitable. But if it has to happen, he doesn’t want it to be because Cas still thinks he’s bullet proof.

Maybe this is an opportunity. 

“Ok,” he says, and strips off his outer shirt and folds it before setting it down near the door.

He does a few stretches to warm up, and then Cas is on him. Sam gets driven back a few paces, nearly to the edge of the mat, before he can get himself together. Cas backs off, rolls his shoulders to ease any stiffness settling into his muscles, and waits until Sam’s ready.

This time, Sam goes on the offensive, pulling his punches, but making Cas work hard to avoid getting hit. Sam’s mindful of the injury his friend already carries, but Cas it seems isn’t. He throws himself into the fight like it’s for real, even though he’s careful to aim his blows to land just shy of actually connecting. For all that, he keeps Sam on his toes as they dance around the room, and Sam starts to wonder if maybe this was such a great idea after all.

And then it happens. He gives Cas an inadvertent opening, but one only a fool would take. It might win him the fight, but to take advantage he has to get in close enough that Sam could take him out too.

And Cas bites.

Sam grunts as Cas’s fist grazes against him, in what would have probably driven a rib into his lung had this been a genuine fight, but he doesn’t miss the way Cas leaves himself open. He wraps his arm around Cas’s neck, locks it with his hand around his wrist and brings Cas down to his knees.

Cas is pinned against him, his fingers trying to pry Sam’s arm away. He tries a couple of times to break Sam’s hold, and then ends up slapping at his arm when he realises he can’t.

Sam lets him go and Cas flops forward onto his hands and knees, gasping.

Fuck, he’d taken that a little too far. He puts his hands on Cas’s shoulders, helps him sit back up, checks his neck. Tiny pinpricks of red are showing on the skin there and around his eyes.

And the cut is bleeding again.

“I’m sorry,” Sam says. “Guess I got a little too into it. You ok?”

“Yes,” Cas says. His voice is rough, hoarse. “Give me a minute and we’ll try again.”

For the second time that day, Sam finds himself lost for words. But he shakes himself out of it and gives Cas an apologetic shrug. “I think I need a break, and I need to check that cut again. It’s bleeding. Why don’t we do that and then get some lunch?”

It takes a bit of persuasion, but finally he coaxes Cas out of the room and into the nearest bathroom so Sam can grab a first aid kit.

**

So the fight wasn’t a total failure, even if it did go a little too far. It’s given Sam a greater insight into Cas, into his recklessness or what Sam thought was recklessness.

Now, he thinks he knows better. 

Cas is balancing things out. Weighing them up. He’s acutely aware every time he takes a chance, and he’s considering if it’s worth the pay off. And since most of the time the payoff involves some risk to his person, he is almost always deciding it is.

That scares Sam in more ways than he can count, and makes him feel like a snake. Dean, too. Maybe Heaven put that notion into Castiel, that he was expendable, a warrior and a servant before anything else, but they’ve done little to persuade him otherwise.

And now that’s coming back around on them in a way they can least afford it to. Sam’s totally done with losing people he cares about, and he’s done with watching Dean go through the same. And yes, he knows that even if the three of them retired from the life and opened a flower shop somewhere, at some point they are going to be separated but he doesn’t want it to be now.

He also doesn’t want it to be because some monster tears Castiel’s throat out because their friend sacrifices his life as part of a tactical decision.

**

They get a job the next day, and Dean groans and grumbles – loudly – over it, but Sam knows his brother. Dean’s going a little stir crazy, and for all his complaints he’s the one in the car first, honking the horn when he thinks Sam and Cas are taking too long.

As they grab their duffels, and Dean’s, which Sam knows he’s left on purpose, he catches Castiel’s arm before they start up the staircase to the door.

“Sam?”

Sam stares down at Castiel, at that look of patient enquiry. “Cas, do me a favour. Don’t be so ready to jump into things on this hunt, ok? I mean, you’re still hurt….”

It sounds lame even to him. It’s a cut that needed four stitches; compared to the other shit Castiel’s been through, as an angel and a human, it probably doesn’t even make the top ten of the worst things to have happened to him.

He knows it was the wrong thing to say when Castiel shuts him down with a look. Not angry, maybe a little hurt, but all disappointment. Not at him, Sam realises. Castiel’s interpreted what he said as them not thinking he can do this, so the disappointment’s all for himself. 

“I just meant,” he starts, but Castiel puts a hand on his shoulder. 

“It’s fine, I’ll be careful.”

Dean honks the horn again, long and drawn out, and Sam grinds his teeth a little. 

“Alright!” he almost screams, even though he knows his voice will never carry up the stairs and through the bunker’s rock walls. “I’m going to bust that thing, I swear.”

“He wants to get going,” Cas says, and takes Dean’s duffel from Sam’s hands and heads upstairs to the door.

Sam stares after him, then follows, wondering if maybe he’s made things worse. But all he can do about it now is try to keep a closer eye on Castiel, and try to get Dean to maybe see a little sense at the same time.

If they’re both watching him, how much trouble can he get in?

**

They hit the water at the same time, the sudden plunge into cold almost turning their limbs to lead. But they fight through it, and they have the right motivation.

Maybe twenty yards ahead, Cas is trapped in the middle of an underwater maelstrom that’s pulling him further down and further away from them. Now and again they catch glimpses of the river god hiding within it, his arms wrapped tightly around his prisoner. They’re going to struggle to catch them, but if they don’t then Castiel will be the eleventh person this thing has dragged under and held there to drown.

They don’t know why and their hastily cobbled together plan to kill it might not even work. It’s untested, drawn from what little they could find on the thing in the bunker’s library. A silver knife, with the blood of an intended victim fresh on the blade.

In hindsight, Sam figures he should have seen this coming. He and Dean had been discussing – okay arguing about – how the hell to make that one work. The victims had no connection to each other, or the river, so how will they know who’s next? Hell, some of them hadn’t even been near the river when they disappeared, which makes no sense at all. So random, so totally unexplainable, and while not all of their hunts actually ever make sense, Sam likes the ones that do.

It’s easier, even a little safer, when the monster likes blondes, or the ghost’s pissed because it got overlooked for promotion, or it’s a demon Crowley’s sent to get someone or something.

Once you know what they want, you usually know how to stop them.

All this thing wants, apparently, is to drown as many people as it can, and Castiel’s next on the list.

Sam knows if he and Dean hadn’t been so busy _discussing_ what to do next – and yes, doing it on the bank of the river was probably a dumb idea, but they’d been together and _in the car_ – they might have noticed the disturbance in the water, the way it churned towards them like something approaching under the surface.

Cas certainly did.

If they had been paying attention, and Sam can’t believe they weren’t, not with Cas doing his needs of the many routine, they would have noticed him drawing the knife smoothly across his palm and then shoving open the back door and getting out of the car.

They did notice the river god surging up on to the bank, too late, in the form of a huge wave which broke around Cas and swept him right into the water.

But Cas had still managed to hold on to the knife, and Sam feels his heart lurch as he realises that was Castiel’s intention all along. Because how else could they get close enough to this thing to take a shot – or rather, a stab – at it?

They both break the surface, sucking in air, and Dean screams his fury. “Fucking idiot angel!”

Sam takes another deep breath and ducks back under, but the water’s all churned up. He can’t see more than a couple of feet in any direction. They could swim right past Castiel and the river god and not even know it.

He surfaces again, grabs at Dean before his brother can dive under himself. “Dean.”

“No. No way, Sam, we are not giving up until we’re dragging his ass back to shore. He’s alive, dammit.”

Dean tears himself out of Sam’s grip, takes a breath, but before he can go under, it’s like someone set off a bomb beneath the surface of the river.

The water explodes a few feet in the air, a giant bubble that turns into a mini tidal wave and carries the brothers a distance closer to the bank. They’re left coughing and spluttering, and then Sam hears Dean yelling, “Cas!” and his brother’s stroking his way hard towards something Sam can’t see at first, not with the water so choppy and rough.

Then he does, and it is Castiel, trying to tread water and making it look hard.

Because, and why didn’t he realise before then, he probably doesn’t know how to swim.

He’s on Dean’s tail a moment later, reaches their friend next, and helps his brother keep him afloat.

“What the fuck,” Dean snaps. He tries to shake Cas, but it’s a little hard to do in twenty feet of water. “What the fuck.” 

It’s all he can say, until Sam yells at him to get his attention.

“Once we’re out of the water!” He lowers his voice again, though he’s just as furious as Dean is. “Cas, did you get it?”

Castiel nods, and Sam actually sees him try to smile. But his teeth are chattering too much for him to manage it, and his skin is too pale.

“Ok, we’re out of here,” Dean says, and they haul Castiel between them as they swim back to the bank.

They drag themselves up the dirt and gravel incline, and collapse next to each other. It takes a few moments to even start to get their breath back, but Dean isn’t really prepared to wait.

“What the hell was that,” he demands, turning on his side enough to aim a half-hearted slap at Castiel’s jaw. It loses whatever strength it had between launch and impact, barely even nudging his head.

“We’d no way of knowing how it chooses its victims, or even if it did,” Castiel pants. He’s shaking hard, hugging himself, with the knife still firmly in his right hand Sam realises. “It could have been completely random, or simply a matter of opportunity. So why not me?”

Sam pushes himself upright and pries the knife out of Castiel’s hand. He doesn’t even seem to notice, and Sam figures that’s probably not good.

“Cas, I think we need to get you checked out at a hospital.” He catches Dean’s eye, and sees his brother nod. They haul Cas up, and Sam dumps the blade in the trunk while Dean gets Castiel settled under a blanket in the back seat. Still in his wet clothes, but the nearest ER is maybe fifteen minutes away, and the way Dean drives probably more like five. Better to get there fast and get Castiel checked over than try to dry and change him next to the river he nearly drowned in.

Sam gets in next to Cas, and hauls him up against him, hugs him as tight as he can and hopes he can warm him up a little by the time they get there.

**

The hospital keeps Cas overnight, as a precaution against secondary drowning and to make sure his temperature keeps climbing to where it should be, which means the brothers stay too. It takes all Dean’s charm to convince the nurses not to toss them out, but he manages it somehow.

The local police pay them a visit – a near drowning in a river that’s seen more fatalities this year than in the past hundred would certainly draw their interest. Sam lies smoothly, keeps it simple. Cas fell in, couldn’t swim, and they hauled him out.

It’s more or less the truth if you leave out the bits about homicidal river gods, magical lore and a kamikaze former angel.

Cas sleeps fitfully, mumbling a few times but too low for them to hear what he’s said.

Sam figures if there’s ever going to be a time to get Dean to actually listen to him and realise they do have a pretty big problem here, it’s going to be now.

“He’s going to end up getting himself killed unless we do something about this, Dean.”

Dean’s slumped in one of the hard plastic chairs the hospital reserves for people who’ll be spending hours waiting and worrying by the beds of family and friends. “He ganked the bastard, didn’t he?”

“Really?” He strains to keep his voice low, with Cas sleeping there and the nursing station only a few feet away. The last thing they need is to get kicked out when Dean worked so hard for them to be allowed to stay, but he can’t believe what he’s hearing. “And we nearly lost him in the process. That ok with you?”

Dean’s on his feet, anger flashing in his eyes. “No, it’s not fucking ok! You think I wanted him to drown out there? But it worked, right? He’s got what it takes to do this, Sam. Ok, maybe I think he should have told us before he dangled himself on a hook, but we’ve done crazier shit than that.”

“It’s not the same and you know it.” And it isn’t. Maybe Dean can remember a brief time before their lives were shoved onto this road like they got shunted by a runaway truck, but Sam knew the rite of exorcism in Latin before he knew his times tables. 

Cas might be older than the human race, but he’s only actually lived as one of them for a few short weeks, and commanding a garrison in Heaven as a being of pure energy is a lot different from being a bag of skin, bones and blood that the things they fight can slash, rip and tear apart.

Or drown in rivers.

Of course, Cas has always been defiant; if there was only one way to solve a problem or a situation and it meant taking a hit, he’d take the hit. He’d snuck up on Lucifer while the devil had been orating his grand plans for the death of the world to rescue them from right under his nose. He’d stood up to Raphael even when he knew he’d take a beating because of it. 

He’d taken on Sam’s madness, despite having seen first-hand the horrors he’d endure, because he didn’t know of any other way to fix him.

And because he felt he had to atone, and Sam’s starting to wonder if maybe that’s part of this near suicidal streak Cas is starting to show. Maybe it’s not just down to proving himself to them. Maybe he still feels like he has to make up for what he did, for the times he let them down.

He seems to have pushed aside the times they let him down and the unfairness of that is sour and heavy in Sam’s stomach. 

How far will Cas go before he feels he’s earned being trusted and valued by them? Being forgiven?

He already has all those things, and Sam knows then that they’ve probably missed a hundred chances to tell him, even before Metatron stole his Grace. Now words aren’t going to do it.

Dean slumps back down in the chair. “We say the wrong thing here, he’ll either take off or just shut us out.” He rubs his fists against his eyes. “Fuck, I thought we’d lost him today. What the hell are we gonna do?”

So at least he knows that Dean’s _noticed_.

Sam figures Cas won’t take off, not because one of them says the wrong thing. He’d stay and take it, another incremental redemption.

So the idea that’s pushed itself to the forefront of his mind – the one that’s been getting bigger and harder to ignore since he realised Dean wasn’t up to handling this – could go one way or the other, and has a really big chance of making this whole thing worse.

But right now it’s the only idea he has. Talking alone hasn’t fixed this, and neither has showing Cas just how vulnerable he is.

So really this is the only thing Sam can think of to try next, but Dean’s face when he tells him says that he thinks maybe Sam is crazier than Cas at this point.

But he also doesn’t object.

**

They leave it a couple of days, neither of them keen to put their plan into action just after Cas gets discharged from the hospital. They avoid taking any jobs during that time as well, passing the details on to other hunters in the area that they can trust.

Cas probably suspects and if he does he’s probably translating that into more self-recrimination. He can’t see the vicious circle he’s trapped in, like he was still an angel and it was burning with holy oil. He takes chances to get things done, and prove that he can, and then he gets hurt taking chances, which means he just has more to make up to them and more to prove.

On the fourth evening after they get back, the only physical record of Castiel’s battle with the river god being the stitched up cut in his hand, Sam gives Dean a look and goes to sit next to Cas on the couch.

Castiel glances up from the book on lore he’s reading when he realises they’re staring at him. “Sam? Dean? Is something wrong?”

“You could say that,” Dean says, and sits down opposite them.

That makes Cas almost rigid with tension. He closes over the book, and Sam can see a nearly imperceptible tremor in his hands. 

“I’m fine if there’s another hunt,” Cas says, but Sam can hear everything he isn’t saying. He thinks they’re angry with him, and maybe that they’re going to kick him out.

Sam knows that nightmare’s been in Cas’s head, awake or asleep, since he finally made it to the bunker. He doesn’t know why; maybe because they didn’t go to get him, maybe because of the very things he’s trying to make up for now.

Maybe because neither of them have actually told him this is his home, just took it on faith he’d know.

Cas has faith in them – which Sam’s about to take full advantage of, God help him – but with such little sense of self-worth it’s clear now he’d never presume to actually believe the bunker was his as much as it was theirs.

“It’s not about a hunt, Cas,” Sam says. “It’s about you. We’re worried about you. So we’re going to try and deal with this tonight.”

“I see,” Cas says, and Sam can see that he actually doesn’t. 

“You scared us with what you did,” Dean blurts out. “Cas, you need to stop trying to get yourself killed.”

“That’s what you think I’m trying to do?” Cas sounds incredulous, and Sam can understand because that genuinely isn’t what Cas is up to. He thought Dean had got it, but maybe he hasn’t or just can’t cope with the fact that Cas’s behaviour is on them. Not entirely, but they bear a chunk of responsibility for it.

“No,” Sam says, and shakes his head when Dean shoots him a puzzled stare. “We don’t think you’re trying to kill yourself, Cas. We just think that you’re too ready to get killed if you think it’s necessary.”

Cas’s focus is suddenly on his hands. “I haven’t taken any risks that both of you wouldn’t be prepared to. Is there a reason why I’m to be treated differently?”

Sam suddenly feels like he’s crossing a frozen lake on the first day of spring, and he can feel the ice cracking and shifting under his feet. “Yeah, Cas, there is. There are. Your reasons for taking those risks.”

“To achieve a successful outcome to whatever hunt we’re on,” Cas says. There’s a bluntness to his voice, suddenly defensive. “To get the job done. Isn’t that the point?”

Sam nods. “But we both know there’s more to it than that. Cas, you don’t anything to prove to us. We know you can handle yourself. We’ve seen you do it, and we trust you to have our backs.”

“So why are we even discussing this?”

“Because you seem to think you have something to prove, Cas. That you owe us.”

Dean chooses that moment to add his next contribution, and as soon as he’s opened his mouth Sam wishes he hadn’t bothered.

“Look, all that shit with the souls, the Leviathans, Naomi and Metatron? We’ve all screwed up, Cas, but you just need to let it go, man. It’s done, ok? You can’t change the past anymore.” 

The road to hell, Sam thinks bitterly. He needs to get Dean and his good intentions out of the room before Cas becomes unreachable over this.

“Dean,” he says. “Go get a soda.”

“I’m fine,” Dean says. He’s still staring at Cas, and Cas is staring back at him now with a look on his face that _hurt_ doesn’t come close to describing.

“Go get one anyway,” he says, and his tone is sharp enough to draw Dean’s attention onto himself. 

Dean must read in his face just what he’s feeling about his attempt at helping, and he looks a little ashamed.

“Yeah, I could use a drink,” he mutters and stalks out of the room like a brewing storm.

Sam just hopes he sticks to cola without the Jim Beam. 

“You didn’t need to chase him out,” Cas says, after a moment. “Everything he says is true. I’m human now; I don’t have any power at all, never mind being able to go back and put right all that I did wrong, Sam. And it’s better I try to make amends like this, as a human. As one of you.”

“Why?” Sam demands. “Because it’ll hurt more? Because you’ll feel it? Cas, you don’t have to bleed to earn forgiveness. We’re not going to tot up every injury you take or every hunt you work with us and see where that leaves you in the ledger. That isn’t how this works.”

Castiel’s on his feet suddenly, but Sam can see from his face that he isn’t sure what to do or where to go. “It’s the only way it will work. It’s the only penance I know.”

Sam grabs his wrist before Cas decides to just pick a direction and start walking. If he backs down now, he doesn’t think he can work himself up to this again another time.

“We’re going to do this, and it’s not because of why you’ll think.”

“Do what, Sam?” Cas doesn’t try to tug free, and Sam gets a sudden hope that it’s because he doesn’t want to. But he still isn’t looking at him.

“What my dad used to do to me when I messed up, Cas. Back then, I used to think he was just pissed at me, furious that I’d got something wrong. But I know better now. He did it because I’d scared him, because he wanted me to be ok. Because he loved me.”

Now, Cas is looking down at him, and Sam thinks he sees a flash of understanding in his eyes. 

“I don’t think it appropriate that you try to discipline me, Sam.”

“I don’t agree.”

“You’re not my father.”

“But I’m your family, Cas, and if this is what it takes to make you stop putting yourself at risk, then this is what’s going to happen. You need to let it. You want to atone? Make things up to us? Then start here.”

He feels like shit for saying it, and the way Cas seems to crumple doesn’t help, but he can straighten that out. He can’t do anything if Cas won’t even meet him halfway on this.

“What do you want me to do?” Cas says, finally, and Sam lets out the breath he doesn’t even realise he was holding.

“You’re going to get over my lap,” he says, and the words don’t even sound like he’s saying them. “Right now, Cas.”

He knows who they sound like, and he both resents that and needs it in that same moment. 

He still expects Cas to baulk, to tug free or just straight out refuse. 

But Cas complies. He bends his knees enough to get into position, and Sam lets him do it on his own. This is how John did it to him. Sam never dared to fight, and always laid himself out over his dad’s knees. Sometimes he was even eager to, because it was better than looking at his dad’s face.

And because John promised him ten smacks would be fifteen if he dared answer him back or refuse.

Sam isn’t going to go that far; bad enough he’s had to guilt trip Cas into co-operating, but he’s beyond desperate, and he’s going to make sure this works.

For a moment, Sam thinks about leaving his sweatpants up, but he doesn’t want anything between his hand and _Cas_ , so he tugs them down enough to bare skin.

Cas starts, and Sam rests his hand on the small of his back. “It’s ok.”

“I doubt that,” Cas says. He’s holding himself rigid again, muscles locked tight so his upper body isn’t hanging over the other side of Sam’s legs. “If it were ok, I wouldn’t be lying across your lap.”

“You’re right,” Sam acknowledges. “Do you understand, then, Cas? What’s not ok?”

Stubborn silence is his reply, and Sam figures again that words alone aren’t going to cut it.

He brings his hand down sharply on Castiel’s ass, and is a little surprised not to get a reaction. There’s no way this has ever happened to him before, so maybe Cas is treating this as yet another proving ground.

Sam’s going to do some proving of his own.

“This is not because you screwed up, Cas.” He spanks him again, a little harder this time, but nothing like what he’d ever had himself. “This is not because you made a poor judgement call. It’s not because you trusted the wrong person at the wrong time.”

The slap of his hand on Castiel’s flesh sounds more severe than it is, but all the same he can see the skin there start to redden. He’s holding back, but he still knows this will hurt.

“Are you listening to me?” he says. He keeps his voice calm, doesn’t dare to let the fear swelling inside him get out, because then he might not be able to keep this controlled. “Do you understand me yet?”

“I… You can’t erase my mistakes like this, Sam. I have to account for them.” His breathing hitches as Sam hits him a little harder before he can even finish speaking.

“Not like this. Not by putting yourself in situations where you’re going to get hurt because you think it’s what you deserve. Do you have any idea how much it would hurt us if something happened to you?”

When Cas answers him, his voice is shaky, almost uncertain. “Yes. I think you would miss my presence.”

Sam knows what he means by presence. He lands three sharp hits in a row, and Cas suddenly tries to push himself upright. 

Sam doesn’t let him, but it’s his words he uses to hold Cas in place. In check.

“You, Cas, not your presence. Whether you’re an angel or not, it’s you we’d miss. Because this is your home, Cas, and you’re our family, and we want you to be safe. So let me do this!”

Cas doesn’t slump forward, but he stops trying to get up. His hands are braced on Sam’s knees, making the position awkward for them both – not as awkward as what Sam’s doing, but his desperation over this shoves that aside – but Sam delivers another four hard swats, and then he realises Cas is asking him to stop.

He’s done anyway. He doesn’t have any more in him, so he has to hope what he’s done is enough.

Sam’s next instinct is to help Cas up, but before he can Cas just slumps off his lap and ends up sitting awkwardly on the floor. His pants are still hanging down, and he struggles a little to pull them up without raising his ass off the floor.

Sam can see his eyes are red, and tears are starting to build there.

“Cas,” he says. “Cas, I didn’t want to do this, but it’d kill us if anything happened to you. You want atonement? Forgiveness? You want to feel like we need you? You already have all of that, Cas. You’re our family. And every time you put yourself at risk it’s us that are getting hurt. So you are going to stop that, Cas. You’re going to stop.”

By the time Dean reappears in the doorway, Cas’s face is streaked with tears. He cries quietly and in such a restrained manner that Sam wonders if this is just so new to him he’s maybe a little shocky. His breathing is way too fast and jerky, though, and Sam knows if he doesn’t calm down soon he’s going to hyperventilate.

Which is what he thinks Dean might do when he virtually explodes.

“Sam, what the fuck! What did you do?” 

Sam’s a little speechless as Dean shoots into the room and drops hard to his knees next to Castiel. He’s even more speechless when Dean pulls Cas against his chest, hugging him so tight that his grip might solve Cas’s rapid breathing issue the wrong way.

And Cas lets him.

“It’s ok, Cas,” Dean says. He rubs one hand through Cas’s hair, cups it at the base of his skull. “Come on, it’s ok. Settle down for me. Come on, Cas.”

But Sam sees the furious look Dean gives him over Cas’s head.

“I didn’t give him more than ten hits, Dean, and I didn’t do it hard. I don’t think he’s this upset because it hurt.”

Dean gets his hand on Cas’s shoulder and eases him back. “You scared us,” he says, quietly. “You scared me and you scared Sam, and we couldn’t think of any other way to make you see that. I can’t lose you, Cas. Neither of us can, so please stop. Please.”

Cas gives him a hard, jerky nod, and then Sam gets up and leans forward enough to help Cas get up. Dean follows, stiffly, but by then Sam’s pulled Cas in for a hug of his own.

He can barely believe it when Cas hugs him back, wrapping his arms around Sam’s waist.

“I’m sorry,” he hears Cas whisper against his chest.

“I know,” Sam says. “Me too. But it’s gonna be ok, Cas. I promise.”

**

There are no such things as miracle fixes, and they know it. 

Things go wrong; problems occur and they sometimes disagree on even the most basic of things.

Like pancakes being better, or not, than oatmeal.

And sometimes they still disagree on things not so basic, but thankfully not in the same realm as the things that have seem them walk away (or be driven) from each other before.

So when Cas suspects the succubus they’re hunting might be the local Sunday School teacher – like hiding a nympho in a nunnery, Dean says, looking a little turned on and grossed out at the same time – and decides to go and confront her alone, Sam figures it’s a relapse.

They’ve all been addicts of one sort or another, so he’d been expecting the occasional backslide, especially if Cas has hit a low, or something’s happened to wither the tiny bud of self-worth they’re cultivating in him.

When they get back to the motel room, Dean waits until Sam’s got comfortable on the edge of the bed, and then rests a hand on Castiel’s shoulder.

“You know the drill, dude,” he says and then glances at Sam. “Ten?”

Sam thinks it over. “Eight,” he decides. “And only because you called us first before you went in. But when we told you to wait….”

Castiel’s already kicking off his pants. “I should have waited. It was an unnecessary risk.”

Sam nods; hopefully it won’t be long until Cas finally accepts he’s too important to them to be trading his life for absolution and a sense of being valued. He’s come a long way over the past few months and while they’re not there yet, he can see light at the end of the tunnel.

“Ok, then,” he says, as Cas settles himself over his lap. He ruffles Cas’s hair, and lets his hand settle on his ass. “Let me know when you’re ready.”

**Author's Note:**

> For the following prompt at SPN Kink Meme:  
>  _Non-AU. Cas hasn't been human very long, but he wants to hunt with them. Dean and Sam are shocked when Cas keeps forgetting he can't heal himself and puts himself in danger. He kicks ass/is a BAFM, but he's being way too risky._
> 
>  
> 
> _Sam decides one night after a hunt that it needs to stop, Dean agrees because they're scared he'll REALLY hurt himself. Cas doesn't see a problem with it, but Sam tells him he's going to give him a spanking so he'll remember to take better care of himself._
> 
>  
> 
> _Sam isn't cruel about it. He just explains to Cas what he's done wrong and spanks him bare-assed over his knee. Dean steps out to grab a soda while their discussing things and comes back to Cas on his hands and knees on the floor sobbing so hard he can't breathe._
> 
>  
> 
> _Dean freaks, thinking Sam beat the shit out of him, but Sam explains he'd only hit Cas about ten times, not even that hard. The guys help him up, then comfort him, talking to him, telling him he's forgiven, that they just don't want him to get hurt on a hunt._
> 
>  
> 
> _Cas really didn't like it, but he understands and even likes getting cuddles. If you'd like to, feel free to include other times Cas endangers his own life and gets spanked and/or Sam threatens him with a spanking._
> 
>  
> 
> _Dean doesn't really like it, but he knows it helps. Sam isn't an asshole, he just wants SOMETHING to work and to keep Cas alive._
> 
>  
> 
> _I'd rather the spanking(s) be the focus, but if you want to include a pairing or Sam/Cas, Dean/Cas, or Sam/Cas/Dean I'd be fine with that. Thanks :)_


End file.
